If there was any justice in the world, then Blue Beetle would have soared much higher at the box office than it currently has, with the well-received origin story for Xolo Maridueña‘s only having earned around $115 million globally.
While the actor’s future has been confirmed by James Gunn, the chances of a solo sequel have taken a serious hit, because no matter how much the rebranded and overhauled DCU will distance itself from its struggling predecessor, it’s hard to imagine Warner Bros. signing off on spending huge amounts of money on the follow-up to an opening installment that didn’t turn a profit.
It was the franchise’s third bomb of the year following Shazam! Fury of the Gods and The Flash, and you’ve got to wonder if Maridueña would have fared better with the paparazzi had his superhero debut turned out to be a massive hit. As he revealed on the Los Lobos podcast, he was sitting right next to Selena Gomez at a recent soccer match between Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami and LAFC, but nobody seemed to care about the freshly-minted comic book hero when the singer and actress was at his side.
“Dude, why did I get cut out right there. Wait. Yeah, I got f*cking Mike Wazowski’d, but not Tyga! But Tyga got to keep there? She’s standing next to a superhero, bruh. Bro, the first brown superhero! She’s gotta give some love. She has to come out with a statement.”
It’s unfortunate that Maridueña ended up channeling the spirit of Monsters Inc., but maybe the assembled photographers simply prefer Only Murders in the Building to the DCEU.
